lemons and cheese. but mostly cheese.

if i had to name my three favourite ingredients, they would be lemons, cheese and tomatoes, without question and without doubt. (don’t ask me about my favourite food. currently, it is lemon curd, but i understand that i cannot subsist on that alone. this will change in the next forty-eight hours).

so, it’s kind of a surprise that i have never, not ever, made cheesecake. ever. it’s not surprising that i rarely make lemon cake, because my sister-in-law is allergic to citrus fruit, and i’m far too nice a person to leave her devoid of cake. my lemon cake recipes have been successful, and i’m sure i will share one with you sometime soon. but, tonight, it’s about the cheesecake.

my friend, mikael, and i have been talking about getting together for the past six weeks. he works shift work and goes to school, and i work and go to school and try to find time to blog and bake and make my house look halfways presentable for company. so, today he asked when would be good for a barbecue next week and i said friday, and then he said what about tomorrow. and like that, we had a date.

which, basically meant that i had twenty-four hours to produce dessert. and, i’ll be damned if i’m bringing strawberry shortcake. (i have nothing against strawberry shortcake, but i’m pretty sure that i’ve made it for mikael twice now. i especially have nothing against rachel‘s shortcake. i think i will make that on sunday.)

so, there was cheesecake. and, might i say, it turned out spectacularly. but, the lemon curd is still my favourite.

the cheesecake was adapted based on several recipes, about four in total. i didn’t want a crust (andrew hates crust), and i wanted it to be thick. and, boy, it was.

preheat oven to 350 degrees. with mixer on medium speed, beat the cream cheese until smooth, add the sugar and blend well. add the eggs, one at a time, blending well after each addition; i mixed them first and then added them… i don’t know how much it mattered. add the cornstarch, cream and butter, one ingredient at a time and blending well after each addition until well mixed. mix in the lemon zest and the white chocolate.

wrap the outside bottom of the pan with aluminum foil to seal and butter and flour the pan. pour the cheesecake mixture into the pan and place the spring form pan into another larger pan or dish filled with 1 inch of water.

place the two pans in the oven and bake at 350 degrees oven for 1 hour. if the cheesecake is still a bit jiggly, you can leave the oven door open, but the oven turned off to allow it to cook more. remove the cake from the oven and loosen the cake from the pan with a sharp knife but don’t remove the rim.

cool to room temperature and refrigerate for 4 hours to chill. remove the rim and garnish to your heart’s desire. (in writing that last bit, i can’t help but think that a bit of mint would be nice).

the lemon curd deserves its own post. you’ll just have to wait. same goes for the photos.